There were nearly 48,000 U.S. opioid overdose deaths in 2017, 742 in Washington, and 39 in Clark County. PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center and Lifeline Connections are involved in some new initiatives to reduce those death totals.
Lifeline, which provides substance abuse treatment, is part of a statewide campaign with the Washington State Health Care Authority to raise awareness of the Washington Recovery Help Line, which people can call or text 24/7 to communicate with someone who can connect them with proper recovery resources.
PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center and Lifeline Connections also have rolled out a new program to immediately connect people with medication treatment and recovery services if a hospital patient needs substance use help.
The Recovery Help Line also launched a medication assisted treatment locator tool on its website last month, which allows people to find local MAT services through the web. MAT combines behavioral therapy and medication to treat substance use disorders. Lifeline has nearly 300 people using its Medication-Assisted Recovery Program.
“I think the health care authority doing this larger launch to promote recovery and the help line will push so many more people to get help,” said Kaylee Collins, Lifeline’s director of the Medication-Assisted Recovery Program. “Progressing forward in technology will help everyone in all facets.”
Vancouver resident Charles Hanset, 38, has struggled with substance use disorder since his early teens. He has been receiving medication assisted services through Lifeline since June 2017, and is approaching two years of sobriety.
Hanset takes Suboxone for opioid addiction through Lifeline. Before entering Lifeline’s program, Hanset overdosed on opioids six times, he said. Hanset said Suboxone takes away his craving for opioids — what the medication is designed to do.
He said Suboxone — and counseling he receives — has made him feel renewed and hopeful. Hanset now has his three children back in his life: a 16-year-old daughter, a 13-year-old son and a 3-year-old son. He also visits grandparents twice a week and takes his youngest son to see his mother each Sunday. Hanset volunteers on local boards, coalitions and alliances to help others with addiction. He tells people struggling with opioid use disorder, “If there’s a heartbeat, there’s hope.”
“It just lets me know I have a chance to live,” Hanset said of Suboxone. “I have a chance to be a father today. I have a chance to be a part of my community today. I have a chance to give back.”
A quicker path to treatment
PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center is using a $426,000 grant from the Washington State Health Care Authority to create a hospital-based opioid treatment network. The idea is that if a patient comes to PeaceHealth for treatment and is struggling with opioid use, PeaceHealth can immediately start that patient on medication, and pair the person with services through Lifeline before discharge.
“The goal is to have patients treated with medication where they are, and not wait until they get out of the hospital, because that’s a very vulnerable time for them,” said Annie Neil, a registered nurse who is heading PeaceHealth’s program along with Dr. John Hart, who works in physical medicine, rehabilitation and addiction medicine.
The grant funding runs for one year, and is renewable for a second year. Neil said that during that time window, PeaceHealth plans to create a sustainable program that can last beyond grant funding. Dr. Lawrence Neville, chief medical officer at PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center, helped Neil and Hart get the grant and is aiding their implementation of the program.
Hart said it’s time for the medical world to start taking responsibility for the role it played in the opioid epidemic.
“We created this problem,” Hart said. “How many people in the street started on heroin their first dose? Zero. What did they start with? They started with Vicodin, Percocet, a prescription I wrote. I wrote an excessive number for the medical problem just to make the patient and everybody feel happy. And that excessive problem found its way into the marketplace.”
Hart hopes that PeaceHealth’s efforts to lower treatment barriers are a step in the right direction. PeaceHealth is also working to get all of its hospital physicians and emergency department doctors MAT certified. PeaceHealth hopes other hospitals will implement similar ideas to pair patients with proper recovery services.
“We’re hoping this will work so well in this hospital we’ll be showing it to other hospitals,” Hart said. “We’ll be taking it around.”
